


Songs the Minstrels do not Sing

by DachOsmin



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blackmail, Choking, Face-Fucking, Forced Orgasm, Humiliation, M/M, Prisoner of War, Public Sex, Revenge, Shame, boot kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-02
Packaged: 2018-12-19 16:11:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11901339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DachOsmin/pseuds/DachOsmin
Summary: “I wanted to line the road to Agoviana with the heads of you and your men. And as your father rode his army south to settle his precious peace, he would see your sightless eyes staring back at him and know what it is to lose a son.”





	Songs the Minstrels do not Sing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [heeroluva](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heeroluva/gifts).



Giachet is careless after his victory at Alcautin. 

He has no thought for caution or carefulness or restraint in the days after the battle, only joy. And what pure joy it is. Alcautin was a reckoning for the Sulari infidels. Giachet’s daring cavalry charge had smashed their left flank into pieces and scattered the main force into an ignoble retreat. Already the bards are calling Alcautin a watershed that may well herald the end the war.

The renown feels good on his shoulders. The serving girls now blush and giggle when they pour his wine; the knights now give him respectful nods as he walks by. Most precious of all is the golden blessing of his father’s smile, so rarely seen and so greatly treasured. He has proven himself no boy, no simpering princeling, but rather a man, a king-to-be.

A victory ride with his companions seems the very least of the celebrations he deserves.

They ride out from the keep at Agoviana just before high noon, whooping and hollering as their destriers eat up the countryside beneath sure hooves. The steel of their armor gleams under the brilliance of the sky; their capes feather and snap behind them on the swiftness of the wind.

They ride, and Giachet feels like one of the soldiers in the minstrel songs.

The others seem in high spirits as well. Sly Mertin tells of his exploits with a crofter’s daughter outside Zanillas, and Liontel laughs along. Dauit and Jephre pass a wineskin back and forth in between ribald jokes. Even Raphias, ever the curmudgeon, has a smile on his face. And at Giachet’s side is Alesse with his sweet curls, worshipful and innocent, looking at Giachet like he holds the world in his hands.

They ride, and Giachet thinks that this is the best moment of his life. They are young, they are alive, they are gods of youth, summer, victory, and all other sweet things in life.

The joy is all-consuming; he is drunk with it, and thus he is wholly unprepared when they crest a hill and find themselves in the midst of a Sulari war camp, a company’s worth of longbows aimed at their hearts.

~*~

There are too many to fight, at least four score to Giachet’s own paltry dozen.

The urge to draw his sword is strong anyway. Knights in the songs never surrender: they fight at five to one odds, ten to one, a dozen, a score. The thought of surrender sits bitter in his stomach. But it is of course the wisest option: no one, not even the Sulari, would dare kill a Trebanese prince in cold blood. There is a protocol for this, they will ransom him back to his father for a few chests of gold. And the serving girls will snicker behind his back, and the knights will once again see him as a child. His father will retreat into that awful mask of cold disappointment. But he will be alive. His men will be alive.

Sometimes a choice is no choice at all. He will not buy his honor with their lives.

He raises his hands slowly up into the air, gesturing for the others to do the same. “I am prince Giachet. I seek to parlay with your commander,” he says, letting his voice carry. This close to the border most men speak a smattering of both languages, but the Sulari are silent, their judgement hidden behind the steel of their helmets.

He hesitates, then repeats the words in Sulari, tripping on the harsh consonants. His tutor had always judged his accent to be rough but understandable. He prays it is enough.

Still there is no response, and his heartbeat thumps so loud in his chest it near seems everyone can hear it. His muscles begin to burn from the strength of holding his armored arms aloft; beside him he can hear Alesse’s labored breathing.

At last a Sulari soldier wearing the plumed helmet of a commander shoulders his way through the bristled longbows.

Relief floods him. “My lord, I am Prince Giachet-“

“Dismount,” the man snaps, and Giachet almost trips in his stirrups as he hastens to obey. His men follow suit, huddling together protectively as the horses mill around and stamp their hooves in agitation. The Sulari begin to buzz with whispers, but they speak too quickly for Giachet to understand but one word in ten. “Prince,” he hears. And “Alcautin.”

The fragile peace lasts until the Sulari begin to take his men’s weapons away. Most hand their swords over sullenly. Alesse, bless him, is shaking so hard he drops his rapier in the dust and then stumbles picking it up. The Sulari laugh as his pale skin flushes red; Giachet almost speaks up. But then one of the men is gesturing at Mertin’s hunting knife, and Mertin is spitting in the man’s face as he swats his hand away. “You’ll not have it, you worthless cur; I’ll fuck your sister’s corpse before-“

Rage flares in the warrior’s eyes, and then his sword is flashing bright under the brilliant blue sky, and Mertin’s head is toppling from his neck with a spray of blood, eyes comically wide.

Giachet is screaming, shoving his way towards Mertin’s headless body-

A pain at the back of his head, and then darkness takes him.

~*~

He comes to in the confines of a dungeon cell, hemmed in by shadowed rock and a thick door girded with iron bracers.

His men are slumped against the walls in silence. His heart skips a beat as he counts them; he cannot lose them, he cannot lose any more of them-

The arc of Mertin’s head flashes against the insides of his eyelids as he blinks. He can almost taste the blood in the back of his throat when he swallows.

Someone coughs beside him. He starts, hand going to the sword he no longer has- but it’s only Alesse. Despite the stale heat of too many bodies jammed close, he’s shivering. His eyes are shadowed, and there’s a bruise marring the fair skin of his cheek.

Giachet reaches out to towards the bruise. It hadn’t been there before. What happened after he was knocked out? “Alesse…”

But Alesse flinches away from his touch. “It’s no matter, milord.”

Giachet opens his mouth to disagree: it matters very much; Mertin’s head bouncing away like a pigskin ball matters, the way Alesse won’t meet his eyes matters.

But before he can find the words a harsh clang of metal cuts him off, and then the cell door creaks open and two Sulari guardsmen peer in at them. They’re impassive in burnished leather lamellars over red silk robes. Palace guards, then, not soldiers on the move. How far have the Sulari taken them?

The right-hand soldier narrows his eyes, scanning the floor of the cell. “Which of you is the prince?”

Next to Giachet, Alesse straightens, licking nervously at his lips. Giachet sees the way he draws the guards’ eyes: this beautiful fragile blond creature with eyes like gemstones.

Oh, but it would be so easy to shrink back and let the guards make their assumptions. And Alesse would do it: take his place and take whatever punishment comes with it.

He can’t let that happen. “I am the prince,” Giachet says as he staggers to his feet, and is gratified that his voice is steady and even. He sounds like a prince, not some scared boy in far over his head.

The guards watch him, assessing. At last they nod and wave him forth, placing a hand on each of his shoulders as they lead him away. He hisses as they exit the dungeon and light floods his eyes. He blinks away tears, stumbling blindly in whatever direction the guards have chosen. 

Even when his vision clears, all there is to see are passageways of sandstone and the occasional arrow slit casting light onto the flagstones. The guards’ gauntlets are heavy on his shoulders. He stares at the floor and counts their paces in his head. The guards are silent as they walk; there is nothing but the echoes of their footsteps off of thousand year old stone to pass for company.

They stop at a massive pair of oak doors inset into one of the courtyard walls, girded with steel bracers and guarded by another pair of soldiers. A nod from the guard at Giachet’s left, a nod from the soldier on the door’s right, and the doors are opening inward onto a dark hall.

He peers inside, expecting a torture chamber, some spare and ugly room writ with old bloodstains and the rank scent of fear.

It’s a garden.

Not the Trebanese sort of course, with raised beds of aster and dahlias open to the sky. Instead the chamber is lined with blue tiles and strewn with urns holding all manner of shade loving plants: leafy terraces of caladium and fern, bright sprays of orchids and lilies. Far above, through the shade of the palm leaves, he can make out the glint of colored glass. A glass roof- his eyes widen at the extravagance of it. The air is cool, and sweetly scented with sandalwood and jasmine smoke from the hanging braziers.

As he stares, the guards take their hands off him and step away. He stands still for a moment, and his bafflement must show on his face, for one of the guards gives him a rough push forward and gestures towards the end of the hall.

He eyes the scimitar glinting at the guard’s waist. He could duck low and take it, stab the man up through the hole in his armor at his armpit. He could swing around and maybe take the second. But the third? The fourth? He swallows. A hero would try. Mertin would have tried.

But Mertin is dead, a headless corpse choking on the dust of the wayside, and he has ten other men alive and imperiled still weighing on his conscience. He cannot bargain their lives away on the folly of a hero-story.

He realizes he’s been staring at the sword. He looks up to give the guard a stiff nod, and sees knowing mirth reflected in his eyes. Gods, but the arrogance of the Sulari. So sure of themselves. It makes him want to spit on the tiles.

He remembers the bruise on Alesse’s cheek. “Thank you,” he croaks instead, and enters the garden.

The walls are inset with fountains; the gurgle of water echoes off the tiles of the floor, masking sound so that he can hear only the barest hints of voices from further within the chamber. He walks in the direction of the voices.

Even though he’s a prisoner in an enemy land, even with all that’s happened, the beauty overtakes him. He walks by ferns and day lilies and cunning vines that twist up the columns to hang their flowers from the ceiling arches. There are broad palms stretching towards the eaves and tiny orchids that hide under their leaves. There are strange flowers he’s never seen before and doesn’t know the names of.

He’s so entranced that he almost doesn’t notice when the plants recede and he steps into a small patio. Palms and ferns hug the walls, but space has been cleared to fit a folding desk and an array of stools. A man sits at the desk, intent on the papers in front of him. Four guards stand at attention behind him. They’re motionless as Giachet steps into view, but he can feel the burn of their eyes on him as he approaches.

The man at the desk does not look up. Giachet stands awkwardly before the desk, shifting from foot to foot. An agonizing span of minutes passes. He resists the urge to wring his hands.

The man finally sets down his quill with a soft sigh and looks up at him. He has fine features and long black hair pulled into a simple braid. His broad shoulders are covered with a plain robe of raw silk. His fingers and the hems of his sleeves are stained with traces of ink. A scribe or a scholar, maybe? Perhaps he’s been appointed to write the ransom appeal to Giachet’s father.

“Prince Giachet,” the man says with a dip of his head. His voice is honeyed and dark, with only a hint of a Sulari accent on his vowels. “I must apologize for the quality of your accommodations. I had not expected so regal a guest.”

Not a scholar then. The seneschal, perhaps. He tries for a cocksure smile. “I would be happy to leave and lift the burden from your shoulders.”

The man ducks his head with a soft chuckle. “So considerate! But my brother would have my head. And I hate to disappoint family.”

There are warning bells ringing in his head. “Your brother?”

“Mehiraud, he’s named.” Giachet’s confusion must show on his face, for the man clucks his tongue in reproach. “You met him once, at the armistice at Cartalla. I was there as well- but you were only a child; perhaps you don’t remember.”

Cartalla. The site of the last armistice, ten years ago. The peace held for six months before Sulari horsemen raided the border by Zanillas and war came rushing back. Giachet remembers his father throwing the parchment signed by the Sulari king into the fire, cursing the treacherous infidels down to their bones. “There were many men at Cartalla,” he hedges.

“Mmm,” the man hums, tapping his quill against the edge of the desk. “But only one on a white stallion, his armor chased in gold. You remember, don’t you? You asked to pet the horse.”

His palms break into a sweat. Because he does remember the horse, and the man. The way the sun had gleamed on the golden cuirass and vambraces, and the glitter of silver mail beneath the enameled breastplate. The horse, white like snow on the western mountains. And on the man’s head, a crown.

He had met the Sulari king at Cartalla. The king this man named as his brother. Which means this man is-

The realization hits him, and with it the fear, sudden and cold as if he has just fallen through an ice-crust on a frozen lake.

“So you remember,” the man murmurs, watching him. Not just any man. Nessadine Ai-Tayya. The man they call the Eagle in his homeland and the Black Pox everywhere else. They say he can bend the wills of beasts and birds to do his bidding; they say he can suck men’s souls out through the slits of their helmets. He’s never lost a battle. Except for one.

Giachet swallows and opens his mouth, but there is nothing he can say. The weight of what they both know of the other hangs heavy in the air between them, and for the first time in a long time, Giachet finds himself wishing he was no prince at all. He would trade this poisoned paradise and the gleam in Nessadine’s eyes for the dungeons and a harsh gaoler. He would do it in an instant.

Meanwhile Nessadine is smiling. “Your father must be so proud of you, princeling. Barely a man, and already winning renown on the battlefield. I’ve heard the songs on the lips of the bards that come south- they say you killed three-score men at Alcautin.”

“The bards exaggerate,” Giachet whispers. He tries to stare at the flowers, at the tiles, at anything- but Nessadine’s gaze catches and holds him like the eyes of a pit viper might a mouse. “I did as any soldier would.”

Nessadine raises an eyebrow and offers him a lazy smile. “But it’s true that you led your father’s forces to victory at Alcautin.” He rises up from his stool and stretches leisurely before sauntering, step by step, to stand before Giachet. He’s just a hair too close; instinct demands Giachet take a step back. But he can’t; he can’t give any ground or this perilous peace between them will come crashing down. He shifts his feet awkwardly in place instead and hates himself for his weakness.

Nessadine tilts his head. “I’d never lost a battle before Alcautin. I must admit, your strategy with the cavalry wedge was well thought out. You’ve read the classics. So few have these days. Taulicius?”

“Yes,” he whispers. “And Aidatus too.”

Nessadine claps him on the shoulder with a soft laugh. “Wonderful! Truly, you bested me fairly in the field. I freely admit that.”

Giachet lets out a shaky breath. Perhaps he has misjudged this man. Perhaps the stories are all wrong and he is no monster after all. Why, even now Nessadine might invite him to sit, and they will break bread together and discuss the long-dead strategists over wine.

Nessadine’s hand on his shoulder clenches suddenly. His fingers grow tighter and tighter, digging painfully into Giachet’s collarbone. Giachet lets out a gasp. “What-“

“If it had been any other battle, or you any other man,” Nessadine says, his voice still light and airy despite the crushing vise of his hand. “I might have spared you. But you see, princeling,” and his voice sours, curdling like milk, “my sons were at Alcautin, too.”

Giachet hears the words without understanding them at first, as if Nessadine were speaking another language. And then the hate in Nessadine’s eyes crashes into him like a landslide. He’s going to die here, his men are going to die here- “My lord, I-“

The slap is as sharp as it is unexpected. Reeling, Giachet falls to his knees. His heart is hammering in his ears; he tastes blood on his tongue and a sharp pain in his nose.

Nessadine steps closer, looming down at Giachet like judgement. He rests the heel of his boot against Giachet’s neck and presses down with infinitesimal, brutal pressure. “I wanted,” he breathes, “I wanted to line the road to Agoviana with the heads of you and your men. And as your father rode his army south to settle his precious peace, he would see your sightless eyes staring back at him and know what it is to lose a son.”

Giachet closes his eyes and holds his breath, ready for the swing of a sword or the crush of a boot to the face. Death is waiting in the wings. It won’t be long now.

And then Nessadine is lifting his foot away. “I want to, even yet. But I can’t.”

Giachet tries and fails to get his breathing under control as blood trickles from his nose to make a mess of his lips and chin. Nessadine won’t do it. Of course he won’t: because no honorable man would, because killing a soldier in the heat of battle and executing a captive in cold blood are two entirely different things.

But there is no mercy in Nessadine’s eyes, only quiet rage. “My soldiers have been… indiscreet. My brother knows I have you, and he wants you alive and whole for the peace talks.” He kneels then, leaning in to whisper hot against the shell of Giachet’s ear. “And besides: my quarrel is not with your father.”

The possibilities churn in Giachet’s stomach. Will Nessadine have him maimed? Unmanned? Oh, but he’s heard the stories, the whispered nightmares of the havoc Sulari surgeons wreak on the bodies their victims. “My father will not suffer me harmed,” he says, and hopes his voice is not really that high and breathy.

“Princeling,” Nessadine murmurs, “there are ways to break a man that leave no marks on his skin.”

Immediately he thinks of his soldiers, bound and bloody without him. Clever Liontel, Gherand with his kind eyes, Tolivere, who always sings off-key. And sweet worshipful Alesse. “My men,” he croaks, “please don’t hurt them-“

Nessadine draws back and slips a finger under Giachet’s chin, forcing it up gently. “They need not come to any harm.”

“Please, I don’t, anything, I-“ Giachet can hear his own stuttered pleas in his ears but they don’t make sense; the words he’s seeking are eluding him, drowned out by the hammering in his chest.

“Hush.” Nessadine strokes a finger up Giachet’s cheek and presses it gently against his bloody lips. He lets it rest there until Giachet falls silent and then smears the blood across Giachet’s lower lip like women’s paint. “You will do as I tell you.”

And even though every muscle is screaming for him to run, there’s only one thing he can say. “Yes.”

Nessadine sighs deep and low and brings his other hand up to cup the sides of Giachet’s face. He leans forward and presses a chaste kiss to his forehead. “Good boy.”

Giachet jerks back; he can’t help it. “What-“

“Squeamish, princeling? If you cannot bring yourself to submit, perhaps one of the others would? The blond one with the sweet mouth, perhaps. Have you had him?”

Alesse. No.  _ No. _

Nessadine nods at his silence. “Then I may take all your protestations from now on as formalities?”

“Yes,” he croaks.

“Excellent.” And then one of his hands is pulling Giachet close so that their chests are touching and Giachet is trapped neatly between his legs. The other hand twists into Giachet’s curls and yanks his head back; his mouth falls open at the shock and pain of it. And then Nessadine is kissing him- hard on the lips first, then licking at the blood on Giachet’s chin, then plundering his open mouth until Giachet is gasping for breath.

Giachet feels the kisses like blows: there is no tenderness in this, only rage. Nessadine is marking his vengeance into the soft places of Giachet’s body: he scores his teeth across Giachet’s jaw, sinks them into the column of his neck, laves his tongue over his trembling collarbone.

He feels Nessadine’s fingers graze the laces of his baldric and then withdraw. “Stand.”

He stumbles to his feet. “Sir?”

Nessadine’s eyes are dark. “Undress yourself.”

Giachet glances away to see the impassive faces of Nessadine’s guards- gods, have they been here the whole time? “I-“

Nessadine taps a finger on the hilt of his belt knife. “Or I could do it, if you wish. But it will not be pleasant for you.”

Giachet’s fingers go to the laces of his baldric almost of their own volition. He is a spectator to his own body; there’s nothing he can do but watch in horror as he undoes tie after tie. His fingers are stiff and clumsy.

The baldric falls away, crumpling on the tiles. The boots are easier, and the tunic is easier still. His breeches and smallclothes feel like an afterthought.

And then it’s done and he’s standing naked as his name-day, hands cupped over his groin like a blushing maiden. He’s more than a bit chilly, he realizes with no small amount of hysteria. Here he is, utterly exposed before the brother of the Sulari king and four of his bodyguards. And he’s fussing about the cold.

Nessadine’s voice cuts through his panic. “Kneel, princeling.”

His knees buckle. He falls to the ground; the tiles are cold and hard beneath his knees and palms. They’re blue, like the ocean. He wishes they were water in truth, that he might sink into them and be spared this.

Nessadine steps closer. “Good boy.”

It’s sick- it’s utterly repulsive- but he’s soothed by the words despite himself. 

Nessadine moves closer still, until he’s a hands-breadth away, the sash of his robe hanging at eye level. Every muscle in Giachet’s body seizes, there is nothing he wants more than to scramble backwards. But he cannot, and so he sits still as a statue, the air burning in his lungs as he forgets to breath.

Nessadine strokes a hand over the fall of his hair and gently pushes his head forward. Giachet shudders as his cheek presses against the silk of the robe. He tries to focus on the feel of it, the rough scratch of the threads catching on his stubble. He feels hazy and blurred, like he’s a visitor in his own body. The only anchors to the earth are the silk against his skin and the weight of Nessadine’s hand on the back of his head.

Nessadine raises his other hand to his sash, and then the fabric is sighing as it falls to the ground. The robe slips open. 

Nessadine’s cockstand is just below eye level, ruddy and already pearled with a bead of precum on the tip.

Nessadine takes himself in hand, his other hand holding Giachet’s head in place as he guides himself to Giachet’s mouth. Giachet, breathing raggedly through his mouth, can already taste the bitter scent of it on his lips.

“Wider, princeling.”

Helpless, he does as he’s bid and hates himself for it. 

Nessadine guides the tip to rest on his lower lip, and then he’s pressing forward, unrelenting and inexorable. Giachet gags as the first taste of precum hits his tongue, his fingernails digging crescents into his thighs to keep from choking or pulling away. Nessadine hasn’t said what will happen if he feels a tooth. He doesn’t need to. 

Giachet’s eyes blur with tears as he takes it, inch by inch. The girth stretches his mouth wider and wider until a steady ache kindles in his jaw. The length is even worse, hitting first the palate on the roof of his mouth and then the back of his throat. Nessadine lets it rest there a moment, murmuring soft affirmations, and petting his hair in the cruelest kind of gentleness. 

“You look so pretty like this, princeling.”

Giachet concentrates on breathing through his nose, staring at the tiles of the floor through the blur of his tears. He can’t look at Nessadine or the guards, else he’ll see himself reflected in their eyes. He is a measure away from panic; he can feel his body beginning to shiver with it, his fingers already icy cold where they grip his thighs.

Above him, Nessadine sighs. “You seem tense. I suppose you think me a very poor host.”

Giachet jerks when he feels the unexpected touch between his legs. He looks down to see Nessadine has moved his leg forward so that the leather of his boot is flush with Giachet’s flaccid cock.

“Rub yourself against it.”

He thrusts hesitantly forward, the side of his cock flush with the calf of the boot. The motion fucks Nessadine’s cock in and out of his mouth, making him cough and gag; Nessadine’s hand in his hair tightens in warning. 

He thrusts again, this time with every measure of willpower focused on keeping his throat from rebelling. 

The feel of the leather against his cock almost undoes him.The boots have been freshly oiled and so the leather is slick against his skin, and warm. His cock twitches, and neither the tears blurring his eyes nor the blood and precum slick on his lips is enough to keep the desire from pooling in his stomach.

Nessadine leans down to wipe away the tears. “Ah princeling,” he says. “What would your father say to see you now?

The horror of the thought is jarring, visceral, and utterly useless at arresting the swell of his cock. He thrusts forward again when Nessadine yanks his hair in warning; this time the underside of his sac rubs at the toe of the boot and he moans around Nessadine’s cock, even as his eyes prick with more tears. He clenches his eyes shut; he cannot face this any longer.

Nessadine laughs. “Oh, but you cannot close your eyes to this. My men are watching. And they’ll tell their fellows and their fellows, until every soldier you ever face will know how you revelled in servicing your enemy like a common whore.”

Nessadine pulls his cock out and snaps it back in again, driving Giachet once more against the leather of his boot. Nessadine groans; the vibrations rumble through Giachet’s body and settle hot in his stomach.

Nessadine begins to fuck Giachet’s mouth in earnest then, thrust after lazy thrust as he smooths his hands over Giachet’s hair in a parody of affection. As he snaps his hips forward and drives his cock deeper down Giachet’s throat the motion rubs him on his boot, and try as he might Giachet can’t ignore or avoid the horrible, shameful pleasure of it.

It’s all too much: by now he can’t breathe; he can only suck in tiny gasps of air as Nessadine pulls out before his next thrust. He’s choking around Nessadine’s cock, chest shuddering and black spots dancing over his eyes as a mess of spit fouls his chin and drips down onto his chest and bare thighs. He wants nothing more than to die on the spot.

But his cock is harder than ever. Everything is smudged together- fear, guilt, shame, and the terrible terrible heat of his lust.

His body has betrayed him, and even as he struggles to breath he’s rutting against Nessadine’s boot in futile aborted thrusts.

On the next thrust Nessadine shifts his boot up to meet him, and as he sucks in a full lungful of air he’s coming, the orgasm tearing out of him in hot spurts that paint Nessadine’s boots white.

And as he falls apart Nessadine makes a strangled sound and then he’s pulling out, even as Giachet shivers through the aftermaths of his crisis.

He takes himself in hand, two quick strokes and he’s coming all over Giachet’s face. The seed splatters over his cheeks and puffy lips, clings to his tear-stained eyelashes and catches in the curls of his hair. 

In the silence that follows, Giachet slumps in on himself, staring at the bloody crescents his fingernails have dug into his thighs.

He vaguely notes the creak of a door opening, and footfalls on the tile.

“-Get him washed and dressed and deliver him to the king with my blessing.”

Strong hands loop under his armpits and drag him to hit feet. His head lolls back and he sees Nessadine is once again sitting at his desk, quill in hand. His back is turned to Giachet and he looks for all the world perfectly put together, without a hair out of place.

The man begins to drag him away.

“Oh, and Serim?” Nessadine calls over his shoulder.

The hands holding him pause. “Yes, my lord?”

Nessadine turns and meets Giachet’s eyes. He taps his quill once against his hand, thinking. And then he’s smiling softly, and the darkness in his gaze is a terrible thing to behold.

“Kill his men.”


End file.
